Passing on after a conversation with our landlord, which did not cheer me so much as the pale ale, we continued through the same desolate country for about two miles, and then turned off on the left hand towards Dali. We passed through a narrow valley of several hundred acres planted in vineyards, and we counted four olive-trees, the first green objects or signs of trees that we had seen since Larnaca! We then continued through white barren hills for another two miles, and descended a steep hill, halting for the night upon hard flat gypsum rock opposite a village named "Lauranchina," above the dry bed of a torrent, twelve miles from Larnaca. On the following morning, after a slight shower, we started for Dali. The narrow valleys were more or less cultivated with vines, and about three miles from the halting-place we entered the fertile plain of Dali. This is about six miles long, by one in width, highly cultivated, with the river flowing through the midst. As far as we could see in a direct line groves of olives, vineyards, and ploughed land, diversified by villages, exhibited the power of water in converting sterility into wealth. I always make a rule that the halting-place shall be at a considerable distance from a village or town for sanitary reasons, as the environs are generally unclean. All travellers are well aware that their servants and general entourage delight in towns or villages, as they discover friends, or make acquaintances, and relieve the tedium of the journey; therefore an antagonistic influence invariably exists upon the question of a camping-ground. It is accordingly most difficult to believe the statements of your interpreter: he may have old friends in a town to which you believe him to be a stranger; he may have the remains of an old love, and a wish to meet again; or he may have a still more powerful attraction in the remembrance of an agreeable cafe where he can refresh himself with liquor, revel in cigarettes, and play at dominoes. It is therefore necessary to be upon your guard when approaching a town, which should be looked upon as the enemy's camp. My amiable bullock-driver, the big Georgi, had always assured me that "game abounded in the immediate neighbourhood of Dali;" of course I knew that the happy hunting-ground contained some special interest for himself. Upon arrival on the outskirts I ordered the vans to pass on the outside of the town, and I would seek a camping-place up-stream. Instead of this I was assured that we should pass through the town, and find a lovely grove of olive-trees by the river-side, the perfection of a halting-place. For the first time I now discovered that Georgi's wife and family lived in Dali, and that he was not such a fool as he looked.